“You wanna come to a show?”
“Who?”
“St. Vincent.”
“Venue?”
“The Fox.”
“In Oakland?”
“Yea.”
“Maybe. I’m in the balcony if I do.”
“Okay.”
“I wish it could be just Annie Clark on an empty stage and no one in the audience but me.”
“You wish everything was just you.”
“Me plus one.”
“You wanna come to a show?”
“Who?”
“St. Vincent.”
“Venue?”
“The Fox.”
“In Oakland?”
“Yea.”
“Maybe. I’m in the balcony if I do.”
“Okay.”
“I wish it could be just Annie Clark on an empty stage and no one in the audience but me.”
“You wish everything was just you.”
“Me plus one.”
My first wife was a gorgeous long-haired brunette with whom I lived in an apartment in a large city. She cheated and I ended it. I was left financially fucked. The second wife had a short haircut and seemed more mature than the last. We married in Atlantic City after a brief cocktail at a bar that overlooked the neon landscape. We did well for a while but we began to have fights that ended with me throwing televisions through the walls of a hotel room. We divorced. I kept all my money this time. The next wife was a blonde Norwegian woman who seemed quite kind and settled down in her ways. We lived together in a wine country. We planned to develop our own vineyard. I was away at work a lot and she seemed to feel I didn’t care. She left me. She didn’t want any of my scant financial holdings. The fourth woman to be my wife was vague in her appearance, but young and eager to please. I taught her things. She seemed genuinely interested in being with me. I painted nude portraits of her and wrote poetry. We lived on a boat until she met a young man at a South African port and ran away to be with him. I sailed as far south as the boat could take me and shot myself in the head. My body never decayed and the boat floated into a cluster of icebergs. I was pulverized.
My first wife was a gorgeous long-haired brunette with whom I lived in an apartment in a large city. She cheated and I ended it. I was left financially fucked. The second wife had a short haircut and seemed more mature than the last. We married in Atlantic City after a brief cocktail at a bar that overlooked the neon landscape. We did well for a while but we began to have fights that ended with me throwing televisions through the walls of a hotel room. We divorced. I kept all my money this time. The next wife was a blonde Norwegian woman who seemed quite kind and settled down in her ways. We lived together in a wine country. We planned to develop our own vineyard. I was away at work a lot and she seemed to feel I didn’t care. She left me. She didn’t want any of my scant financial holdings. The fourth woman to be my wife was vague in her appearance, but young and eager to please. I taught her things. She seemed genuinely interested in being with me. I painted nude portraits of her and wrote poetry. We lived on a boat until she met a young man at a South African port and ran away to be with him. I sailed as far south as the boat could take me and shot myself in the head. My body never decayed and the boat floated into a cluster of icebergs. I was pulverized.
It may come from dreams. The good dreams, the distantly warm and affectionate dreams. It may come from the kind of dreams that make waking up alone, cold, and in the dark an unacceptable reality. Yet the alternative—a warm body invited into bed for the sake of a warm body—is worse. It is weakness. It is a betrayal of the notion that someone is worthy of this place beside me. Someone’s arm is better laid across my chest. Someone is most beautiful lying naked on her side with me behind her, enveloped, warmer than any dream and certain in her belief that we are deserving of each other.
It may come from dreams. The good dreams, the distantly warm and affectionate dreams. It may come from the kind of dreams that make waking up alone, cold, and in the dark an unacceptable reality. Yet the alternative—a warm body invited into bed for the sake of a warm body—is worse. It is weakness. It is a betrayal of the notion that someone is worthy of this place beside me. Someone’s arm is better laid across my chest. Someone is most beautiful lying naked on her side with me behind her, enveloped, warmer than any dream and certain in her belief that we are deserving of each other.
We were seated at a white plastic table. It had a big green umbrella posted right in the center and hovering over us, keeping moonlight out. It had begun to cool down after yet another unexpectedly warm day. I undoubtedly had a fine sheen to my forehead. There’d been too many glasses of beer (one passed around like a joint at some point). We discussed Obama’s forthcoming win as the lesser of two evils, or rather one evil and one fucking insane possibility of regressing to the most ridiculous rhetoric and policies I’ve heard in my lifetime. There was talk of period sex versus anal sex, and even those who were grossed out by talk of blood or shit had to admit one might be better than the other. We discussed fetishes and my lengthy monologue about the dangers of always going one step further, one rung higher, and why sexual satisfaction is the cornerstone of healthy adult relations, regardless of the extremity of said satisfaction. We discussed everything because I encourage it. No one wants to go too far, so I do.
Then we discussed love as it pertains to selecting a mate. It jumped back and forth across the table while I sat quietly and stared at the cars driving along the nearby street. It annoyed me that we’d selected that bar and that table, in a place less intimate than I like. We could see young couples pushing strollers just a dozen feet away.
I took a moment.
Someone encouraged me, finally. “You had a lot to say about girls who get off on violence. Nothing on love?”
I had a foolishly sophomoric thought just then: they wouldn’t understand. But, in the spirit of open communication, I spoke up.
“I don’t know. Love is fucked up and I feel I need it too much sometimes, so I never give it. Love is like a hunger. It’s like I want to eat every part of you, the feet and the eyes and the hair, and even the organs, even though I don’t like them. I want everything. Once I’m there, I don’t hesitate. I don’t understand how it builds up. For me, it starts here, when it seems like it should start down here, when it starts at all. It’s no different from fucking. I want and I take. Then, sometimes, I’m a stone.”
There was an awkward silence, typical after some of the things I say. Awkward for them, anyway. I was watching the neon lights of the plumbing store across the street. A wrench smiled at me.
“Anyway, I’m a fucked up case. What’re you gonna do?”
Someone laughed, finally, and said something. I made note of their reactions. I thought I might someday write about something like this. It would have been nice to remember the end of it.
We were seated at a white plastic table. It had a big green umbrella posted right in the center and hovering over us, keeping moonlight out. It had begun to cool down after yet another unexpectedly warm day. I undoubtedly had a fine sheen to my forehead. There’d been too many glasses of beer (one passed around like a joint at some point). We discussed Obama’s forthcoming win as the lesser of two evils, or rather one evil and one fucking insane possibility of regressing to the most ridiculous rhetoric and policies I’ve heard in my lifetime. There was talk of period sex versus anal sex, and even those who were grossed out by talk of blood or shit had to admit one might be better than the other. We discussed fetishes and my lengthy monologue about the dangers of always going one step further, one rung higher, and why sexual satisfaction is the cornerstone of healthy adult relations, regardless of the extremity of said satisfaction. We discussed everything because I encourage it. No one wants to go too far, so I do.
Then we discussed love as it pertains to selecting a mate. It jumped back and forth across the table while I sat quietly and stared at the cars driving along the nearby street. It annoyed me that we’d selected that bar and that table, in a place less intimate than I like. We could see young couples pushing strollers just a dozen feet away.
I took a moment.
Someone encouraged me, finally. “You had a lot to say about girls who get off on violence. Nothing on love?”
I had a foolishly sophomoric thought just then: they wouldn’t understand. But, in the spirit of open communication, I spoke up.
“I don’t know. Love is fucked up and I feel I need it too much sometimes, so I never give it. Love is like a hunger. It’s like I want to eat every part of you, the feet and the eyes and the hair, and even the organs, even though I don’t like them. I want everything. Once I’m there, I don’t hesitate. I don’t understand how it builds up. For me, it starts here, when it seems like it should start down here, when it starts at all. It’s no different from fucking. I want and I take. Then, sometimes, I’m a stone.”
There was an awkward silence, typical after some of the things I say. Awkward for them, anyway. I was watching the neon lights of the plumbing store across the street. A wrench smiled at me.
“Anyway, I’m a fucked up case. What’re you gonna do?”
Someone laughed, finally, and said something. I made note of their reactions. I thought I might someday write about something like this. It would have been nice to remember the end of it.
If I see a bovine skull I think Pagan, I see fire and bones in the wilds and the gases from the bog. If I see the kneeling I think Ritual, I think of rites and repetitious worship. If I see the bared woman I think Goddess, primal expression of female and corollary to male.
If I had no words, a silent brain, what would I make of this? What must the wordless mind think of such an image? This is a consideration beyond silence. It’s meditation on preconceived images and the nature of natural versus societal.
If I see a bovine skull I think Pagan, I see fire and bones in the wilds and the gases from the bog. If I see the kneeling I think Ritual, I think of rites and repetitious worship. If I see the bared woman I think Goddess, primal expression of female and corollary to male.
If I had no words, a silent brain, what would I make of this? What must the wordless mind think of such an image? This is a consideration beyond silence. It’s meditation on preconceived images and the nature of natural versus societal.